This would be a very helpful thread if everyone would offer their winter snow tire selections. I recently received a brochure from TireRack devoted to winter tires. I am planning on purchasing winter wheels with dedicated snows for next winter...much to research though.

Tirerack has some interesting research articles comparing winter tires with All Season. The link below although 3 years old has some guidelines for choosing a Snow Tire versus an Ice Tire. My Michelin XIce Xi2 are an Ice Tire and are not very aggressive in deep snow but all the surveys seem to state that they are the greatest thing since sliced bread. I think my next winter tires are gonna be either Hankook IPike W409 or studded Cooper Weather-Master S/T 2.

Once the new year rolls around I'm going to put some good tires on my Patriot. I don't even want to chance a winter here with the Firestone Affinity tires it came with!

My 2011 FDI Patriot came with 215/60R17 Firestone Affinity's. They actually performed very well in the snow. It surprised me frankly after reading what some others have said. I had absolutely no problems driving in snow with them. Not even bad storms and I got into a couple good ones with them. At least try them out before swapping. You might be happy with them and could save some $$$.

I ended up swapping mine out( 225/65R17 Firestone Destination LE2 )because I waterfowl hunt from Oct - Feb and when I had my duck boat on towing in bad weather it was causing issues going downhill. The Patriot weighs 3400lbs and my duck boat weighs 1700lbs. So I added 50% of the vehicle weight behind it. The Affinity's couldn't keep their grip going downhill with the boat back there if the roads were slippery. Made for a few scary moments and made me swap to a better tire for my needs.

As said though for regular driving they were fine in the snow. No complaints. had MUCH worse in the past.

Anyone install snow tires on their Compass/Patriot? Wondered how the driving experience was compared to all season treads. Thank you.

I have never felt the need to run dedicated snow tires on any vehicle( RWD, FWD, AWD, or 4WD )and the Patriot is no exception. It is a hassle and big expense having to keep 2 sets of rims and tires or having to swap tires on one set of rims 2X's a year. Just not my thing. "IF" I were to ever run them I can only see doing so on a RWD car or 2WD truck. Never on a FWD car or AWD/4WD truck or SUV.

Are snow's better in snow? Sure. Is it so much better that I think it is worth the expense and hassle? NOPE! A quality AS or AT tire will do the job year round. I have lived in NH my entire life and have driven in some god awful winter conditions. Never needed snow's even with 2WD trucks and RWD cars although the snow's probably would have made my life easier on those vehicles if I were honest. FWD/AWD/4WD though, just no need IMO.

It is personal choice though. IF they make you feel safer it may be worth it for you. I just don't need them.

My issue with those 2 links is not so much the results but rather the control factors used or lack thereof. We are never told what AS tires were used on the 4WD vehicles and that can be a big deal. You could easily pick the worst AS for snow and get a pre determined set of results favoring snow tires if they wanted to. Not saying they did this but it is something that could be done. A truly fair comparison would have been to use AS's known to perform well in the snow on the 4WD vehicles and compare those to snow tires on the FWD vehicles. Be fair and upgrade the AS's to good ones to conduct your test.

The FWD vehicles were obviously upgraded to winter tires. By the same token the 4WD vehicles also appeared to be new, but no tire changes/upgrades were reported, so we have to assume that the all seasons being tested were the stock/OEM tires. Stock/OEM tires are many times really poor performers even on dry ground or in the rain never mind in snow and on ice. With no upgrade to premium AS tires known to perform well in the snow made/reported it sets off a Red Flag for me.

I think we can all agree that stock tires be they AS or AT's are generally not the cream of the crop. Sometimes you get a really good OEM tire like the new Cherokee gets. The new Cherokee gets Firestone Destination LE2's on non TH models equipped with 17's and the TH gets Firestone Destination AT's which are both excellent tires( not sure about the Continental 18's used on the Limited - tire is too new to know yet ). Usually however the stock/OEM tires range from mediocre at best to downright god awful crappy. The Goodyear Wrangler HP's that came on my last Dodge Ram 1500 were like driving on greased ball bearings in the snow even when 4WD was used. Another example of a really bad stock/OEM tire would be the Patriot's OEM 16's( Goodyear Eagle LS2 )which are just horrendous. If those 4WD vehicles in those links were running crappy tires their performance will suffer.

What were the tires on the 4WD vehicles tested? Were they passenger car class all season tires like we see used on the Patriot and Compass, or even worse performance or summer AS tires that would really blow in the bad weather, or where they a true light truck/suv class tire that have better tread and thus better bad weather performance? Were they a really good bad weather AS tire, designed specifically for an SUV, like the Firestone Destination LE2 or the Michelin LTX M+S2 or were they a compromise AS passenger car class AS tire that is horrible in the snow like a Dunlop Signature or a Goodyear Eagle? The AS tires used on those 4WD vehicles in the test matter a LOT!

Had the 4WD test vehicles had their tires upgraded to premium light truck/suv class AS tires known to perform well in the snow like the Firestone Destination LE2, Michelin LTX M+S2, General Grabber HTS, etc... I bet the results would have been much better for the 4WD vehicle. Even if they ran a good quality passenger car class AS tire known to do well in the snow like the Pirelli Cinturato P7 AS+, Continental PureContact w/ EP, Hankook Optimo H727, etc... the results would have been better too I bet. Most likely the vehicle with snow's would have still stopped a little quicker and been a little less squirrely in the slalom but the 4WD vehicle would have done better with good AS tires. Without knowing what they ran for tires I can't really be too impressed a FWD w/ snows did better than a 4WD with AS's.

Also, anyone who knows anything about 4WD knows it doesn't help you stop. That part of the test is really misleading due to the tire issue I discussed above. Good AS's in the snow( I mean how they perform )help you stop much better than poor AS's in the snow. Without knowing what kind of AS's were used on those 4WD suv's I could care less that the FWD w/ snows stopped faster.

I would also point out that just because the snows did better in 2 of the tests it does not mean the AS's returned unsatisfactory results. As I have always said while snows may be better overall I use quality AS's and I adjust my driving accordingly in bad weather( even with snow's you have to do so )and I have no problems.

I buy dedicated winter tires for one reason "ICE". I got by the first winter of 2008 with the Goodyear Wrangler SRA's that came with our Patriot. I drove in deep snow on many downhill ski trips and they were pretty good but stopping on ice they were scary. Our 99 Cherokee is my wife's daily driver and it wears Michelin LTX M+S tires which are also pretty good on snow but it is also scary on ice and without ESP like our Patriot. I bought studded Hercules Avalanche Xtreme winter tires for the Cherokee and they are much safer on ice than the Michelins. For 7 months per year our Patriot wears Hankook Optimo H727 and the same story: they don't like to stop on ice. My one time extra cost was 4 steel wheels for each Jeep considering the wear and tear I save on the All Season tires. If I never left Alberta I could probably get by with All Season tires but driving in BC, Montana and Idaho I feel much safer with winter tires.

An AS, by it's very design, is good for MOST driving conditions but. But not designed to be GREAT at any one. My '08 Compass w/183K miles, wears Bridgestone Blizzak snows on a separate set of '07 17" alloy rims. Picked up the used rims for $400. No TPMS sensors. My weekly commute equals 400 miles. AS's just don't cut it in deep snow.